I had a day-long meeting with one of our strategic partners to further develop our inbound marketing strategy. He commented near the meeting's end that he appreciated that we spent our time collaborating instead of having him put on a show-and-tell for me. As he put it, the meeting allowed him to be himself, for which he was grateful.

He said that he imagined that our meeting was like what a Brainzooming strategy workshop would be like. I told him it definitely was.

8 Principles to Create Collaborative Meetings

Want to create meetings that are more about do and accomplish than about putting on a show?

Here are eight principles we embrace to make that happen:

1. Be yourself.
2. Let others be themselves.
3. Don't make anyone conform to an external standard for the proper behavior in a meeting.
4. Discuss things that people really understand and know about.
5. Don't over-manage the process to the point where the process gets in the way of getting something accomplished.
6. Trust that if everyone comes in with good intentions and a bias toward results, good things and productive results will transpire.
7. Use analysis as a platform for places to go, not as a tool to shoot down new thinking.
8. Accept the unexpected.

Looking to create collaborative meetings?

Embrace these eight principles. They work. We use them in everything we do.

Want even more help to create collaborative meetings? Contact us, and let’s chat about how Brainzooming can help facilitate collaborative, strategic meetings for YOUR organization! – Mike Brown

10 Keys to Engaging Stakeholders to Create Improved Results

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